As a sort-of belated wedding gift five years ago, my father-in-law bought us a Woodland Mills sawmill. We were grateful, but could not have anticipated how useful it would be.
Hurricane Helene took down many of our finest trees, mostly the White Oaks, but also many pines and cedars. We drag these beauties to the mill and slowly roll them by hand with the log cant hook, taking off the bark. Usually not until then do we talk about what it will be. For instance, though we need fence posts, we recently cut four cedar mantels. We don’t know yet who might need them, but sometimes a tree just lends itself to a particular purpose.
If we had taken many of these, particularly the oaks, with our chainsaws it would have been terribly sad. It’s still sad, but in a different way. God took them. He alone had the right and he did it quickly, in the cool of the early morning, while we slept. We accept it and only hope to be useful to Him in the rest of the story, to lend ourselves to his purpose. Perhaps he loves the fence-line which the children climb on, keeping in the milk cow, just as much as the regal cedar at the edge of the wood.
Our sawing is slow going, as we often bring the children. I have a blanket for them with a bag full of tricks: apples and books, beanie-babies and bug-spray. But usually after an hour or so, everyone is crying. If I can hold them off long enough, they will quiet down, and watch us. I know they may not remember these moments like we do, but I hope the experience nonetheless leaves it’s mark on them, like a quarter-sawn board.
Since Helene it seems like most of our work is daily laid out for us. We fix what was torn down, make use of what was broken. The world seems more charged, the weather, unpredictable, all things altogether more magical and unaccountable. We know now the terror of falling trees, which nothing can stop, the likelihood that our vision might be crushed by a force beyond ourselves. But we’ve also seen a single sweaty man with a chainsaw bring redemption. If he didn’t have a chainsaw, he would figure out another way. He, too, is an unstoppable creation.
Did God make this barn? Our daughter asked me.
Yes, he did, baby.
She smiles at me sideways, for she knows her dad made the barn. She’s been with him every step of the way and he’s not finished yet.
Kind of makes me want a sawmill . . . .
Beautiful. I’ve been thinking lately about the grace he gives us in just participating in the rhythms of life. To more fully trust his design for creation (life, death, the economies of man and nature) and just be of service as best I can to the small thing in front of me. Your barn is lovely. And your children beautiful. xoxo from Charlotte NC